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The third and final day of Electric Zoo 2017 brought sunny skies, comfortable dancing temperatures and plenty of memorable moments from the heavy bass drops of Sub Focus to the 138-bpm, ’90s-style trance of Armin van Buuren. Even with a massive crowd and some mud from the previous day's rain, the last day of the 6th Boro—as this year was themed—turned upside down, inside out and grooved to the endless beats. Here are the five best things we saw.
RECOMMENDED: Full Guide to Electric Zoo 2017
1. The massive NYC-themed stages
Photograph: Courtesy aLIVE Coverage on behalf of ElectricZooFestival.com
This year’s scale was shocking—the island is obviously still the same size, but the stages were not. After nine years of production, Made Events and Electric Zoo’s creative teams designed their most daring aesthetic to date. Each stage brought ravers face-to-face with imaginative, wild, large-scale scenes worthy of the festival’s magnitude.
2. Sunday's Main Stage headliners
“New York! Let me hear you! Put your hands up!” was the rallying cry we could hear throughout the weekend from the Main Stage—dubbed Elephant’s Roar—as artists like NGHTMRE and Yellow Claw accented the Manhattan skyline with hardstyle heavy beats. EDM has many genres and caters to a broad audience, and even with newer styles constantly popping up, Electric Zoo has found success in sticking to its deep bass roots. Artists like Armin van Buuren, Deadmau5 and Eric Prydz who hail from ’90s desert raves and warehouse massives were among the highlights.
3. Cashless wristbands
Electric Zoo is a cashless festival, which means partygoers needed to load money onto a wristband for all their transactions. One of the worst things to happen at a 12-hour party is to realize you're starving and discover you lost all your bills in the last dance circle. The system is popular throughout many commercial festivals, and it’s improved through the years (at previous fests, the system crashed). Thankfully, there were no issues this weekend. Ravers need to refuel, ya know?
4. The smooth ride getting there
Photograph: Courtesy aLIVE Coverage on behalf of ElectricZooFestival.com
After many years of combining different tickets with different logistics plans, it seems like the 6th Boro nailed what the MTA can’t: easy commuting. Getting to Randalls Island was easy this year. With 9 years of communication between the festival and NYC, the festival was able to hook up guests with a multitude of routes: ferry, subways, shuttles from Output or simply walking the 125th Street Bridge. A huge shoutout of recognition for NYPD keeping everyone along the routes safe for the entire weekend.
5. Zookeepers are the heroes
Safety has come a long way at Zoo since 2013’s tragic deaths. Fear tactics have never worked for responding to typical big-business music festival party favors, and the festival community has had its ups and downs for handling interventions. This weekend’s positive vibes were kept alive with free water-refill stations and the medical ‘Zookeepers’ open dialogue with partygoers.